Where has freedom-loving UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson gone?

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson speaks to the media at 10 Downing Street on the weekend. Picture; Getty Images

The goalposts keep moving and the British nation is restive.

Citizens, having had their COVID-19 jabs, want to get back to a normal, mask-less life filled with joyful hugging, freedom and travelling — but the British government has other ideas.

Boris Johnson’s latest address to the nation this morning has been received as a damp squib, and his prime ministerial message, rather than confirming a moral-boosting opening of freedoms has confirmed what many civil libertarians feared — even more control.

The freedom-loving persona of Mr Johnson disappeared exactly 12 months ago when he was hospitalised with coronavirus and his tepid response ever since has been a disappointment. His nickname now is Captain Cautious.

The huge success of the vaccination program in the UK, which has seen daily death rates attributed to the coronavirus plummet from 1800 a day in January to just 10 on Sunday has not been reflected in the lifting of lockdown measures. Why is Britain not capitalising on its medical triumph and boosting the shattered economy as quick as can be?

While 32 million vaccine doses have been given to the over-50s, medical workers and the most vulnerable, there is a paralysis among the decision-makers.

For only the past week has the public been able to sit on a park bench without being arrested and they still can’t stay overnight at any place except home.

Mr Johnson wants the British public to be satisfied that shops and hairdressers will reopen next Monday — the first time in nearly five months.

Holidays are off the agenda, with any announcement about a traffic light system of countries further delayed amid dire warnings that the May 17 vacation reopening may be postponed.

“Don’t book your holidays,” Mr Johnson said as he warned gloomily of the wicked coronavirus variants that might posed more risk to the public. But not to worry, he assured everyone, he will be in an outdoor pub garden to have a pint next Monday, when such luxuries are finally allowed.

These latest doom-laden government communications have the public facing possible annual vaccinations, carrying around a vaccination passport to enter stadiums and pubs, being tested regularly even when well. And if you want to leave the country for an essential reason, then you’ll need to pay up: a costly test before departure and then at least £210 for two tests upon arrival.

Even Mr Johnson’s much vaunted “freedom day”, June 21, when restrictions were to be fully abandoned, is being rowed back.

A government review has hinted that working from home and social distancing may continue, pending the success of vaccine passports.

All the while, the government’s scientific advisory committee, SAGE, has warned that vaccines are not good enough to see all restrictions lifted and that measures like masks and social distancing should continue for much of the year. Alarmingly, SAGE has modelled a huge up-tick in cases, similar to last January, emerging in the late northern hemisphere summer.

UK chief medical officer Chris Whitty earlier said the coronavirus was harmless to the vast majority of people, insisting people would learn to live with the virus in a similar way to the flu.

But SAGE now says its modelling — which, to be fair, hasn’t been close to being anywhere near accurate all the way through the pandemic — claims that people being hospitalised could return to the levels seen at the start of this year, with more than 30,000 COVID-19 cases using pessimistic vaccine efficacy assumptions.

After being strung along for months and being promised rules would be relaxed, albeit in in a ponderously slow manner, the British public is now no longer fearful and is interpreting hospitalisation and death statistics. Something is happening across the nation as the days get longer and it is what Mr Johnson and his cohorts might fear: people have stopped listening, and instead, are simply carrying on.